Faculty Spotlight

Ekaterina (Katia) Noyes, PhD, MPH

Katia Noyes, PhD, MPH, is the new director of the Division of
Health Services Policy and Practice at the University at Buffalo
School of Public Health and Health Professions.

“Most people evaluate health policies emotionally when they really need to look at the outcomes. Sometimes the evidence is there, but things like politics, religion and other factors get in the way and you don't implement the most effective policy but rather the most culturally appropriate policy.”

Related Links

Katia Noyes, PhD, MPH, is a professor and director of the
Division of Health Services Policy and Practice in the Department
of Epidemiology and Environmental Health, and the director of the
MPH concentration in health services administration. She joined the
University at Buffalo School of Public Health and Health
Professions faculty in September 2016 after spending the past 20
years at the University of Rochester.

Now at UB, Katia's research focus is in all aspects of health
policy, including analysis, evaluation and implementation.

Growing up in Russia, Noyes recalls becoming interested in
health policy after receiving a scholarship to study abroad in the
United States.

"I had a hard time deciding what I wanted to do when I grew up,"
says Noyes. "I was always good in hard sciences but I was attracted
to the potential of medicine to heal and help people live healthier
and more productive lives. When I came to the United States
to pursue an undergraduate program in biomedical optics, I quickly
discovered how many other professional pathways were out there that
combined medicine and science. As I was learning more about the
country and meeting new people, I recognized that the U.S. did not
have a universal health care system but rather a rudimentary public
health system, which was both fascinating and astonishing to
me."

In most European countries, universal health care was
commonplace. The national healthcare and social system were focused
on social welfare not profitability. This was far different than
healthcare in the United States. Not only was the healthcare
system different, but social norms and cultural expectations also
add to the complexity of the topic of health policy.

"In the U.S., the topic of health policy is very controversial
because American culture is all about personal choice and personal
responsibility when it comes to health," says Noyes. "So there is
this conflict between policy and choice which is most pronounced
here in the States, and unfortunately policy research gets caught
in the middle."

The Importance of Health Policy

This is why, according to Noyes, understanding how policy works
and how to design efficient policy is so important.

"There are many examples of potentially beneficial policies that
have been implemented that have negative consequences," explains
Noyes. "Take suburban living for example. When suburbs were
originally developed, they were marketed as spacious green places
to live away from crowded, polluted and noisy downtowns.
People were happy to move away and build their American dream
homes. However, the growth of suburbs eventually contributed to the
deterioration of many American cities, the obesity epidemic, even
greater environmental pollution and tremendous access problems
related to public transportation. Again, a very beautiful
policy that ended up backfiring."

As Noyes notes, there are many aspects to consider when it comes
to taking an idea from inception to implementation in regards to
health policy and often times, there are factors that can impede
that progress.

"Most people evaluate health policies emotionally when they
really need to look at the outcomes. Sometimes the evidence is
there, but things like politics, religion and other factors get in
the way and you don't implement the most effective policy but
rather the most culturally appropriate policy."

Collaboration is Key

After spending nearly twenty years at a small, private college,
Katia says one of the things that attracted her to UB was the
culture of open cross-disciplinary collaboration and the
opportunity to develop new partnerships between the School of
Public Health and other UB schools and community organizations
dedicated to healthy living and population health.

"I think my greatest achievement to date is that I have contributed
to creating a much more open and collaborative relationship between
the medical campus and UB's South Campus. A constant dialogue
between the two schools is very important because building this
communication and changing the culture around how research is
conducted will allow us to move toward better care for a wider
population of patients who historically may have had no access to
appropriate high quality care."